


Talking Sense

by BarPurple



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV), The Tournament (2009)
Genre: A Monthly Rumbelling, Best Friends, F/M, Platonic Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-13
Updated: 2018-05-13
Packaged: 2019-05-06 08:13:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14637744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BarPurple/pseuds/BarPurple
Summary: Belle askes Father MacAvoy for a favour.





	Talking Sense

“Padre, I need a boyfriend!”

Joseph spluttered on the whiskey he’d been sipping from his flask. He wiped his chin and risked a bashful look at Belle because she’d caught him drinking so early in the day. His pang of shame was buried under the confusion at her sudden statement.

“Erm. A boyfriend? Erm, I mean I can preach about plenty of fish, but I’m no dating site.”

It was a weak joke and Belle didn’t laugh, instead she took a deep breath; “Sorry that didn’t come out right. I’m going to start again.”

He watched with a bemused smile as she turned on her heel and left the room closing the door behind her. He could hear her pacing up and down the corridor outside, okay, so she really was starting this bizarre conversation over again. He shoved his flask into his desk drawer and attempted to straighten his rumpled suit, so he’d look more like the sort of priest a parishioner could come to for advice in their time of need.

Belle knocked on the door and popped her head round; “Morning Padre, do you have a moment I need to ask a favour?”

He gave her a genuine smile and beckoned her inside; “Of course Belle, I always have time for you. Pull up a pew, would you like a cuppa?”

She perched on the edge of the offered chair and surprised him for the second time in less than five minutes; “I’d rather have a swig of your whiskey.”

Wordlessly he opened the drawer and handed her his battered hip flask. The worry that had begun because of the tension he saw in Belle gripped his guts as she knocked back a large gulp of the cheap Scotch. Apart from the occasional glass of wine Belle wasn’t a drinker, but she was doing a good impression of him chasing the hair of the dog to ward off the shakes after a heavy night.

She gasped at the burn of alcohol as he took the flask from her hand and fought the urge to have another nip himself. He screwed the cap in place and shoved it into his pocket before gently taking her hand in both of his.

“Talk to me, Belle. What’s going on?”

She breathed in slowly through her nose and held the breath for a count of four. Joseph recognized this as one of Belle’s calming techniques. He waited patiently as she centred herself and hoped that the frantic worry bubbling inside wasn’t showing on his face.

“Do you remember I told you my father is obsessed with trains and railway history?”

Joseph blinked, he couldn’t quite see how her father’s hobby had anything to do with her sudden need for a boyfriend, but he nodded to encourage her to continue.

“He’s decided to take an extended holiday, like a Grand Tour of famous train places.”

Ah now Belle’s worry made sense. Her relationship with her father was tense at best, but as long as there was a fair distance between them they got along alright. Moe French lived in the Midlands, a comfortable few hundred miles from Belle here in Middlesbrough, but Darlington was less than twenty miles away and even Joseph knew that a train buff would want to visit the place that was famous for Stevenson’s Rocket.

Joseph licked his lips and asked the question he didn’t really want the answer to; “Is he coming to visit you?”

Belle snorted; “No, he doesn’t want to intrude on whatever it is I do here, but he has asked if I have the time to meet him in Darlington for a day since it’s been so long since we last spent any time together.”

Joseph winged up a prayer of contrition for his feelings of ire at the father of his best friend. Moe was clearly trying to guilt his daughter into travelling to see him, while still being critical and dismissive of her chosen life.

“He still wants me to find someone special and get married. He’s even started talking about grandkids.”

“And you’re hoping that introducing him to a fake boyfriend will…”

She nodded and picked up his hanging sentence; “The plan is that he’ll see I have a boyfriend and get off my back for a while.”

Joseph had his doubts. He’d do whatever he could to help Belle, even persuade one of the young men in the church to be her fake boyfriend for a day, but he had to voice his concerns.

“Sometimes when people get a taste of what they want it makes them go after it all the harder.”

Belle stood up and started pacing in the little office. Joseph tucked his feet under his chair to give her room. She reached the far side of the room and groaned before gently banging her head off the filing cabinets. He shoulders started shaking and Joseph lurched forward thinking that she was crying. She turned around and he realised she was laughing.

“Oh wow! I was about to turn our lives into some sort of awkward rom-com just to keep my father happy!”

Joseph joined her in laughing; “We’ve watched enough of those on movie night to know it doesn’t always go well.”

“Exactly! I’m such an idiot.”

He gave her a brief hug; “No you’re not, never that Belle. Families are complicated things to deal with.”

Belle squared her shoulders and jutted out her chin; “I’m not a little girl anymore. I’m a successful independent woman in my thirties. Dad is just going to have to accept that he and I have different views.”

She sounded determined and confident, but he caught the flicker of doubt still lurking in her eyes.

“I could come with you to see him, if you wanted, bit of friendly support,” – he leaned in conspiratorially, - “you’d be amaze how many people won’t start a family fight in front of a priest.”

“Not sure the collar will put Dad off if he really wants a barney, but I’ll feel better having you there. Thank you, Joseph. That cuppa sounds like a plan now, I’ll got put the kettle on.”

She was at the door before Joseph asked; “Out of curiosity, who were you going to ask to be fake boyfriend?”

She paused with her hand on the door; “The only person who knows me well enough to be convincing, my best friend, you.”

With a sunny smile she bounced from the room leaving Joseph blinking and blushing. He rubbed his hand across the stubble on his face and smiled. Belle was his best friend. He took the hip flask from his pocket and put it away in the desk drawer before following her to the kitchen.

**Author's Note:**

> For @a-monthly-rumbelling Non smut prompt - Fake dating/arranged marriage


End file.
